Essential Tips For Going Freelance as a Graphic Designer

Freelancing can be super exciting and it can be very scary. It requires a leap of faith, and an understanding that you are your own boss. Therefore, you have to do everything you can to find clients and keep them. With the right set of tools and the right attitude, you can have a successful run as a freelancer. Here are some tips to help you on your path to freelancing.

Be Easy To Work With

This first tip isn’t about how good you are at your craft, how creative your are, or what tools you have mastered. It’s about being pleasant. And it’s one of the most important things to think about when freelancing.

No matter how good you are, if you are hard to work with, client’s will not come back. On the other hand, client’s are more forgiving of issues when they feel like their freelancer is on their side.

This doesn’t mean you have to take abuse from your client, or give unlimited rounds of changes. It just means that you should do what you can to be professional, pleasant, and accommodating when you can within the scope of the project.

Listen closely to your client’s needs. Offer solutions that will work for everyone. Answer questions quickly. Stay in contact, and just try to be friendly. These little things will go a long way towards creating a happy client and will keep work coming back to you over and over again.

Respect The Deadline

The most important thing in any freelance project is the deadline. Yes, there are occasionally projects where deadlines don’t seem to matter. But most of the time, the deadline is everything.

No matter how hard a project gets or what kinds of turns it takes, you must always respect the deadline. This means, if you are getting behind, you must communicate to the client so a new plan can be made. Perhaps, it means adding additional help. Maybe it means changing the scope or budget. Or maybe it means looking for other solutions.

Using a template as a starting place can save a ton of time and get you back on track with tight deadlines. You can use a template as a turnkey solution changing out just what’s needed for a project, or you can use a template as a starting point, using a few elements to jumpstart your project.

Listen To Feedback

When you get hired as a freelancer, you might be expected to give an opinion, but remember that your opinion isn’t always the only one. You are working for a client and they get final say.

This means you need to listen to what the client asks for. Some clients will only have a little feedback and some will have a lot. It’s your job to take it all in and make the most of it.

Sometimes, you can help push the client in the right direction. Sometimes you can offer suggestions, but ultimately, they have the final say. Don’t let your ego get in the way of making your client happy. When a client knows that you listen to feedback and incorporate it, they’ll want to work with you again.

Practice

If you want to get work as a freelancer, you need to be good at what you do. Whether you are a designer, animator, illustrator, or video creator, there are a ton of other talented people vying for the same work.

Make use of downtime by practicing your craft. This can be done in a number of ways. First, you can continue your education. There are lots of great ways to learn online through tutorials. Specific searches on YouTube will always get you results.

Learn New Things

Another great way to be successful is to pick up new skills. If you are a photographer already, consider learning videography. You might be more valuable to a client if you can do both.

If you are a video editor, consider learning some After Effects so you can handle light graphics work. Or if you are a motion graphics artist, why not pick up some editing skills for your client’s needs?

Using the above guidelines, you can learn a lot about new skills for free. Crunch through tutorials and online courses. Pickup free jobs when you can to practice your new skills. Or make up your own projects that you can use to test your new knowledge.

You can also go back to templates as a jumping off point for learning and practice. If you are just getting into After Effects and you want to learn some new techniques, an After Effects template is loaded with ideas to learn from. Download one of the Free After Effects Templates from Motion Array and dig into the keyframes to see how something was done. Or download a Free Premiere Pro Template and get a sense for how pacing in an edit works, or how to use transitions.

The more skills you bring to the table, the more likely you are to get picked for the job.

Going freelance does take a leap of faith and a lot of hard work. But, armed with these tips and a desire to create great work, you can find your way to clients that will be thankful to have you work on their projects.